A Spanish reading program for teaching reading, spelling, and handwriting
Aprendo Leyendo
Effective
Aprendo Leyendo is a beginning reading program that incorporates reading, spelling, and handwriting using multisensory techniques. It utilizes the best instructional practices supported by scientific research and is an effective program for all children.
Comprehensive
Aprendo Leyendo contains all the critical elements of a comprehensive reading program for primary grades: phonemic awareness, phonics, decoding, word recognition, vocabulary, spelling, handwriting, and comprehension strategies. All these vital components of reading are taught simultaneously in integrated lessons, each subject reinforcing and strengthening the others.
Authentic
Aprendo Leyendo was written by Latin American authors. All the stories are authentic and relevant to the culture and people of the continent. In addition, the teacher instructions are concise and easily accessible. There is no need for a large assortment of books and materials for each area of study. Everything children need for a lesson is contained in just two books: a decodable chapter book and a Skills Book.
For Students
Chapter Books
These beautifully illustrated decodable chapter books are unlike any other beginning readers. The narratives have all the basic elements of good storytelling—character, setting, plot, conflict, and resolution. Children love the adventure and humor!
The decodable text only contains sounds that have been taught so that children can sound out the words. There is a repetition of vocabulary to develop recognition of common words and the length of words and complexity of sentences gradually increases. The books provide the practice needed to develop accurate and fluent reading, as well as coherent stories that support effective comprehension strategies.
Skills Books
Each chapter book has a corresponding Skills Book. Comprehensive Skills Books contain activities for teachers to provide direct instruction in phonemic awareness, decoding, word recognition, spelling, handwriting, vocabulary, and comprehension. They are meant to be used under teacher supervision with discussion and immediate feedback.
For Teachers
Teacher Editions
Each chapter book also has a Teacher Edition that provides prompts to support children’s engagement and understanding of the stories. The resulting class discussions encourage logical reasoning, making inferences, and a range of comprehension strategies, including rereading, paraphrasing, and summarizing.
Aprendo Leyendo Teacher Handbook
The Teacher Handbook includes detailed instructions on how to implement the program, as well as words and sentences for spelling dictations for each level of the AL sequence.
Professional Development
The goal of Aprendo Leyendo’s professional development is to ensure effective instruction by teachers and successful reading outcomes for students. To this end, comprehensive teacher training and ongoing support can be tailored to the needs of individual schools and districts and can be delivered onsite or through synchronous platforms. Courses are taught in Spanish by expert master teachers with more than 20 years of experience teaching reading in Spanish to elementary school students. In addition, Office Hours will be available to all teachers teaching with Aprendo Leyendo on the first Wednesday of every month during the 2025-26 school year. Refer to Office Hours in the chart below for more information.
For the first year of implementation, districts and schools that need to train their teachers and staff can take advantage of one of two professional development models opportunities/offerings:
The Aprendo Leyendo Professional Development for Districts and Schools. Comprehensive teacher training and ongoing support can be tailored to the needs of individual schools and districts and can be delivered at a time convenient for each district/school, onsite or through synchronous platforms. We provide support to help develop a model that will meet the needs of all students.
The Aprendo Leyendo Professional Development for Districts and Schools consists of two parts:
Course (8 hours) will cover:
An overview of research-based multisensory techniques for teaching reading, spelling, and handwriting
Teaching Spanish in dual language classrooms
Cross-Linguistic connections between Spanish and English
Components of an Aprendo Leyendo lesson at various levels in the sequence
Planning an Aprendo Leyendo lesson
Instructional practices for developing accuracy, fluency, and comprehension
Meeting students’ diverse needs
Administering and analyzing Aprendo Leyendo’s curriculum-based assessments
Ongoing Support (8 hours) will include:
Coaching teachers based on shared videos of lessons
Feedback sessions
Lesson planning
Placement of students in instructional groups
Differentiating instruction
Pacing of instruction
Instructional language
Assessments
Question and answer sessions
The Aprendo Leyendo Professional Development for Teachers. For individual teachers seeking professional development in Aprendo Leyendo or for new staff hired by districts or schools already implementing AL, we offer the following professional development opportunity delivered through a synchronous platform.
The Aprendo Leyendo Professional Development for Teachers consists of two parts:
Course (9 hours) will cover:
An overview of research-based multisensory techniques for teaching reading, spelling, and handwriting
Components of a AL lesson at various levels in the sequence
Planning a AL lesson
Instructional practices for developing accuracy, fluency, and comprehension
Administering and analyzing AL’s curriculum-based assessments
Ongoing Support (4.5 hours) will include:
Assessments
Pacing of instruction
Differentiating instruction
Instructional language
Question and answer sessions
AL Professional Development Cost:
Course & Ongoing Support 1 teacher with TH (#509) : $575
Completion of either professional development opportunity is essential to the success of the Aprendo Leyendo program in your school or district.
Thereafter (in year two or later), additional hours of ongoing support are available and strongly encouraged.These sessions will give educators the opportunity to dive deeper into the fundamentals of Spanish structured-literacy instruction. Topics covered include reading comprehension, spelling, pacing, grouping, assessments, and differentiating instruction, among others. Refer to the AL Ongoing Support Sessions in the chart below for more information.
Finally, professional development is also offered in specific aspects of the Aprendo Leyendo curriculum, giving teachers the opportunity to dive deeper into the fundamentals of multisensory instruction. These topics include reading comprehension, instructional pacing, spelling, and assessments. Refer to the Refresh Professional Development for AL Schools in the chart below for more information.
